Michael Clifford takes a look back over the year that was.

As an alternative band mixing it up in the mainstream, the Flaming Lips enjoyed a fine run of it between the years 1999-2006. Yet, even if their popularity has declined a little since then, their reputation as one of the world’s greatest live acts remains intact.

Poet Paul Muldoon’s intensely intimate work, ‘Incantata’, is being re-imagined for the theatre and will premiere at the Galway Arts Festival, writes Marjorie Brennan.

The Scottish installation artist is again working with newspaper — 18 tonnes of it — for his return to the Galway Arts Festival, says Richard Fitzpatrick.

Acclaimed contemporary Irish composer Donnacha Dennehy speaks to Cathy Desmond ahead of the world premiere of his prize-winning opera ‘The Second Violinist’.

Garrett Lombard and Druid’s other young guns were eager to put their spin on Beckett’s classic, writes Alan O’Riordan

Ellie O’Byrne meets contemporary dancer Oona Doherty to discuss her tour of Ireland with the show Maria Maria Maria.

Esther N McCarthy spots maritime ceramics, creative waves and a storage solution from the god of the sea.

Esther N McCarthy goes on a world tour at home and finds a bracelet that’s a real charm.

Tommy Emmanuel has shared stages with the likes of Eric Clapton and Jeff Lynne, and is looking forward to playing in the hometown of one of his other guitar heroes, writes Ed Power

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Original Britpop band Suede find it tough going writing albums. But that’s how it should be, bassist Mat Osman tells Ed Power

Are the days of travelling to your local shop for the groceries to become a thing of the past, asks Gráinne McGuinness

Learning from the lessons of history is at the heart of Hughie O’Donoghue’s work, writes Alan O’Riordan

Well, it’s that time of the year again. Stomachs are lined, livers are steeled, and wallets are stuffed for the summer party that is the Galway Races.

An Taibhdhearc, Galway

Galway International Arts Festival

The Menu has spent the last decade bending the ears of any with pockets of sufficient depth and the business nous necessary for creating and maintaining such aforementioned fiscal fortitude about the viability of a ‘permanent’ farmer’s market, believing it to be a marvelous business opportunity with equally positive social implications for the community.

Opening Day of the Galway Arts Festival featuring Patricia Piccinini’s startling sculptures.

A slab table to die for, a heavenly gate and high design from affordable high street brands, Faith Ryan is feeling the love.

MUSIC NEWS: Perhaps it’s fortunate for the Glastonbury organisers that Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs isn’t on their bill this weekend. 

The cash pile at the music firm owned by Kildare singer-songwriter Damien Rice last year topped €415,000.

CORK actor Ciaran Bermingham’s unique selling point is that he is “a small, chubby, balding guy. There’s not many actors like me around”.

Cash allocated to Irish arts organisations from the Arts Council remains relatively similar to 2014 — satisfying the majority of groups.

Cork actor Cillian Murphy made a triumphant return to his hometown last night when he led a stellar cast at the opening of Enda Walsh’s Ballyturk at Cork Opera House. It was Murphy’s first appearance on a Leeside stage since he first broke through in 1996 in another of Walsh’s plays, Disco Pigs.

As Ballyturk is readied for Dublin and Cork, Enda Walsh is already thinking about his next play, writes Alan O’Riordan.

HAVING wowed London’s West End, actress Lisa Dwan brings her acclaimed Samuel Beckett trilogy to Galway’s Taibhdhearc theatre next week, as part of the Galway Arts Festival. It will be a spiritual homecoming.

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READING Star of the Sea is to experience a book of textures, the novel as collage. Joseph O’Connor’s modern classic is a book about books, but also a book about journalism, log-keeping, letter-writing, and 19th-century print culture. It leaps off the page with its multiple voices, but it certainly does not suggest that it is leaping towards a stage.

From food to festivals, culture to shopping, Galway has it all and that’s before you even step outside the city.

MUSIC NEWS: With appearances on the Graham Norton Show and beyond, you’ve probably been seeing quite a bit of Imelda May lately. The Dublin rocker’s publicity drive is all part of the campaign for the release of her new album Tribal, out today.

Minister of State for Tourism & Sport Michael Ring has announced just over €1.3m in funding for 29 festivals and events this year.

Life is getting easier, says Julie Feeney.

IN the arts, January is a quiet month. Yet last week, I saw two major plays, Druid’s production of Dion Boucicault’s The Colleen Bawn and the revival of Martin McDonagh’s A Skull in Connemara.

SOME puppet show. There are moments when you despair for this country. One of those moments was when I heard Minister for the Arts, Jimmy Deenihan, thus describe on RTÉ Royale de Luxe, the theatre company whose proposed visit finally broke the relationship between Limerick City of Culture’s board and artistic director, Karl Wallace.

Modern communications and dance and theatre are merging.

The home of dance in Cork has been selected for a prestigious scheme that will help it connect with existing and new audiences through digital marketing.

THERE are two ways to read Finnegans Wake: aloud, letting the words wash over you, or with slow methodical parsing, going word-by-word, painstakingly teasing out the implications and associations of Joyce’s polyglot puns and neologisms.

Comedian Ardal O’Hanlon has revealed he has returned to Channel 4 to take on a starring role in a sitcom.

The Strypes’ front man Ross Farrelly considers what life would be like right now for the four-piece if the blues hadn’t captured their hearts.

A South African reimagining of the play Miss Julie has been wowing audiences around the world. Richard Fitzpatrick talks to the writer ahead of its Irish premiere.

Huge, fire-wielding dragons will invade Galway city during this year’s Galway Arts Festival. The Barcelona-based street theatre company Sarruga will bring the mythological reptiles to the festival. Expect lots of shrieking from the public as they scuttle along Shop Street with alarming speed.